So This is Home (A Jessica Jones fanfiction)
by blackindiaink
Summary: ***This is a Jessica Jones fic based on the TV show. It is co-written by walksthatlonesomevalley. *** Kilgrave is dead and the deed to her childhood home is in her name. Trish and Jessica try to move on but another case is just around the corner.
1. Chapter 1

So This Is Home

Chapter One

 **Part 1**

Living in the house with her has been a new way of life. So many memories live here, breathe here, and I know nothing about them. Jessica says very little but sometimes I can see things, her mind working the way it does. She'll feel my eyes and I'll pull her right out of that past without meaning to. She gets upset when I study her. She gets worried. I'm not sure if I should be here in this place, not sure if I should disturb these memories of hers that are so significant, but I want to become a part of it somehow, that's all I know. I want to be a part of everything that involves her in anyway because time and time again she's been the one person in my life who has actually loved and saved me, without her I feel like I'm missing a part of my heart. My life gets torn in two. The part with Jess in it and the part without. Without her I'm no more than a half-self, a shadow, why live?

"The wonder twins coming over today?" She can't stand our little meetings for Trish Talk. She lives to make fun of me.

"I'm going to them," I tease. We work better at my apartment anyway. We work better when I'm not thinking about Jess, constantly wondering how she's feeling and what she thinks of me being near her again like old times. Often I feel strange like maybe I should quit my job. The hardest fight is wondering what she really wants. I don't think I can ever know.

When she moved out, before, it was after Kilgrave, the first time. She was scared he'd find me.

When she got the papers about her old house, the house that Kilgrave had bought to give her, it was sort of surprising. I never thought in a million years that Jess would want to keep this house but she obviously did.

Though he's gone, it still hurts to think that maybe Kilgrave knew more about her mind than I ever could, or can...

"You okay?" I was slipping into my thoughts again. This place was new to me but old to her. I still felt outside of it somehow. I hated feeling outside, separate. No matter how I tried I always felt divided from her. We had been family so long but still things like this place could show me that still we weren't part of the same anything, we were separate, even now.

"Yeah," I said, shaking it off. She could always see through me. But then she always lets things slide. She hopes for them to slide. Talking about our real feelings has never been a thing she's been good at. I try but she pushes me out. Always.

But she loves me.

Kilgrave was right about that.

I might be the only person really tying her to this place.

At least now she has Malcom too. Sweet Malcolm.

He's moved in as soon as Jess did. He makes us tea and bakes muffins and sweet cakes. He runs the office that Jess has set up in the common room. He takes messages. He keeps files and does research. He's become essential to her I think. A new person she can lean on. A new person who helps.

Half the time I stay here and half in my apartment in the city. I think it helps too but there are times she can't look at me full on, when she's either in her darkest places or thinking about me. Sometimes I can't tell which is which.

"Want me to drive you?"

"No. Thanks," I smiled. It's better I do things on my own. I need alone time just like Jessica does. The only company I really crave is hers. Sometimes without her it feels like I'm not even breathing but I know that I am.

"We've got this new case. Something to do with a missing girl."

Jess is so prone to these ones. The missing girl cases really get her. They're the cases she takes over others. The cases that trouble her most. The cases that trouble me most because of what they do to her and how she can feel them.

I shoot her a look.

"She's been gone for ten days."

"That's a lot," I say. What else can you say? Why are you doing this? It's too soon? Please don't?

"Her roommate said she was snatched by something, taken straight out of her dorm. Too quick. Unhuman."

"Oh," I sigh. My heart's racing. I want to scream. Sometimes I want to be a hero too. Other times, I just wish we were normal, for once, both of us normal.

I stand up and put my bag over my shoulder. "Be careful," I say. But I know that's never been Jessica's way.

"You too," she says, hardly looking as I walk from her and out the front door. All the way to my car I'm wishing I had something to hit.

 **Part 2**

I sit through the session but all I can think about is what trouble Jess could get into without me there. Always one to go her own way, she had a bad track record for including me in anything that I would argue was a bad idea. It was easier for her that way. She didn't have to consider the guilt connected to me worrying about her.

What she didn't seem to get was that it was going to happen regardless of me knowing about her activities or not. Not knowing made it worse. Telling me about the new case was a step in the right direction though.

Now, that I was over at the house so much it was hard for her to avoid telling me things. Before the second coming of Kilgrave it was easy for her to distance herself. Now, we were tighter, less able to separate.

Still, I knew that someday there a circumstance would arise that required me to be kept out of the loop in her mind. I dreaded it. People change and Kilgrave had severely altered Jessica in ways that she didn't even realize. I saw it all and felt helpless to be there for her at times.

"Um, Trish?"

"Yeah?" I looked up, coming out of the blank stare I'd been stuck in for the past who knew how long. "Sorry, I'm not all here today." I laughed it off, praying that I wouldn't have to come up with a lame excuse. Jessica could tell me not to have feelings all she wanted but that didn't stop them from coming unbidden from the dark corners of my heart.

 **Part 3**

I called Jessica from the road.

"Any requests?"

"Jesus, that was fast… We're still at the college," Jess mumbled. "Apparently this guy was only a kid. We have a few witnesses calling him _**freakishly strong**_."

I couldn't help but let a small laugh escape me. Thinking back on my very own teenage Jess was always a fun time. "Sounds familiar."

"Ha. You're funny," she teased. "Why are you calling me anyway, miss me?"

"Always." I wasn't so good with the teasing. Rather the truth. It was part of our problem I think. Jess could never take my love. She understood it but it definitely scared her just like losing me did.

"Right…" She said it in that way she did that portrayed little to nothing about her thoughts. I hated that I couldn't get inside her mind. But thoughts of the mind would always remind us both of Kilgrave so it was hard to speak them. "Look, I'll be home soon. Food's good. Food and booze. You know what I like."

"K," I tried to be short like her, less in love like her. Okay, poor choice of words. She loved me too much for her own good but that has always been one of my favorite things about her, she's always loved me more than I've been able to love myself. I'd been better before this past year but then she left and practically tore me in two with her absence.

I hung up the phone and sped my car out of the city towards the empty house that Kilgrave bought, the house that I was still amazed to be living in on most nights when the dark and the silence finally set in.


	2. Chapter 2

**Chapter Two**

 **Part 1**

Getting to the house alone and being there alone was sort of strange. I had this need to memorize the place even though I had ultimately no right to be there. Without Jess and Malcolm home I would walk the rooms and touch the surfaces and walls. It was like I needed to be a part of her past. I needed to be a part of her life before her powers, before she was really a part of me an integral part.

This house was her only safe place, her only home. That'd been true for years but I'd never known.

I knew now though and to me it made sense. My mom was never loving. Even I took a long time to be nice and to love Jess…

It hurts to think of how I was back then.

I was trapped... Stupid. Brainwashed more like. Only I knew better, even then.

My mother had tried to make me a stupid girl and I just took it all and tried to live the best I could in _**her**_ world, her version.

Jess stopped her. She always did.

Before her, I had it in me but I couldn't do it alone. I needed her. I've always needed her.

I heard a door and voices downstairs.

"TRRRIIISSSHH?!"

"UP HERE!" I yelled. "BE DOWN IN A SEC!" I was never in a hurry though.

There was never enough time to try and memorize this place. On some days I spent hours just sitting in Jessica's childhood room and trying to imagine her there, the Jess who existed before she was forced to have to meet me.

"Hey."

A lot of times she'd catch me.

"Hey," I said, fixing my hair and trying to act like I hadn't just been meditating on her past.

"You okay?"

"What? Ahhh- yeah," I smiled. "Just tired," I lied.

"Food's downstairs," she said, looking down at my hand and taking it. "Come on."

My heart always jumped when she had me.

I followed behind, feeling hers. It had always been my favorite feeling.

Only thing that could ever trump that feeling was saving her and being her hero. I live for that but I'm not sure if she knows…

When we're both around the table there isn't much talking unless I initiate it. Jess doesn't talk much without a good reason but I try to get her to tell me about her days. Her nights I don't ask about. Those are sometimes spent away from me with people that I don't really want to know exist.

It's been like this since Kilgrave. Before, there were guys… and girls, but Jessica was different. Everything was. No matter what feelings we had for one another we never said anything. She was happier before Kilgrave but neither of us knew what love was outside of one another.

 **Part 2**

Often, in this new place, I get this feeling inside. It's funny because this feeling is old. It's the feeling I used to have when Jess and I were just kids, when we were just beginning to know one another, when we were just beginning to love without knowing why.

The first time I felt it, it was just a comment from her, just a small gesture. I remember it though. I remember it vividly.

My mom had gone away for a weekend and left us alone. We both knew it'd be more than right living without her but neither of us spoke it in the beginning, we just did our little dance around each other, that dance we still do where we both pretend we're not the most important people in each other's lives when we both know the truth.

At the very end of that weekend, right before my mom came home, Jess came and sat on my bed while I was reading. At first I ignored her but then I put my book down to see what it was that brought her in.

"I like it like this," she said, laying back on my bed and ignoring my gaze.

"I know," I said. For the first time ever I saw Jessica's hand and knew I wanted to be holding it more than doing anything else in my world. I don't usually feel like that for people. I still don't. I reached over slowly and took her hand in my own. When she didn't pull-away I squeezed her hand in mind and felt strong. She let me feel strong.

She looked over at me then and smiled, I could tell though that there were happy tears in her eyes. As weak as I was, I could still make her feel.

Butterflies swam inside me for the very first time, real ones, not just small flutters.

I sat up a long while to just be with her, feel her, and hold her hand. I knew at any second my mom would be home and our safe space would be a dangerous one once again.

That was the first time though, the first time I actually felt like telling her, saying it. I heard the words clear as day in my mind but I knew better than to let them come out.

Sitting with her like that all I could think to say was, _**I love you…**_

But I held it in. I always did. And it's always been hard.

I'm not like Jess, I can't stand to hold things in, not important things. I'd rather talk myself out of words than have to think about something I should've said but never did.

That feeling, it's back. Not that it ever really left. Before Kilgrave came back again I'd been too careful with her and she hated that. What he'd done to her that first time? It was so wrong. I couldn't think of anything other than how she must've felt, trapped by him, grossly used. I was too caught up with those thoughts. I was drowning in them and she watched and felt sorry for me. That was the worst.

It's no wonder she pushed me out. I was a constant reminder of all she'd experienced.

She didn't want to think about it but it was all I could think.

She had lived these things and I hadn't been one to help her, more one to assume she found something better than me, something worth living for.

When she came back and told me the truth all I felt was that I wasn't good enough, I should've been there, I should've saved her, I should've seen through it all and found a way to get to her. She always saved me. With her I always failed.

"You've been creepily quiet today."

"You going out?"

"No, just..." She paused a beat in the doorway as if scared to cross the line and enter the room. She had her hands in her jacket pockets. Her jacket was zipped up even though she was home and apparently in no rush to leave.

"Come 'ere," I urged, forcing her in. I was relaxed now, reading, resting in my pj's. Malcolm had helped to turn her old room into a space for me. I wondered what she saw when she looked at the space. Did she see me? Did she see her past? What was it? And why did she choose this room if it was going to upset her?

I wondered if there was another room in the house where I could be, a room that would be more inviting to her. I'd live in the garage if it meant she'd be more comfortable staying with me in there.

She walked in and I motioned to take her hand so she gave it. I pulled her to sit, rubbing my thumb over her soft skin and hoping for time.

"What is it?" I asked.

"I'm trying to get used to this place but it's hard to erase."

"Erase?"

She glanced at me. "Kilgrave," she said simply.

"You could've sold it," I reminded.

"No," she said.

I wondered if perhaps she believed in fate.

"Okay," I said, trying to find a way to keep her talking. Sometimes it was impossible though. Soon as things got real she left, that was always her way. "I'm getting sleepy," I said. "You should get in here and protect me."

"Ninja's don't need protecting," she teased. I still didn't know how she really felt about all that training I'd done. She hadn't really said.

"What if I want protecting?"

"You don't," Jess said, knowing it.

"Okay, wrong choice of words," I said. "Just get in here, okay? I can tell you want to." I let go of her hand and pulled the cover up from the bed. I turned to the nightstand and shut off the light. It bothered me that the door was open so I got up and shut it. Then I pulled my shirt off and threw it on the ground. It was hot in the house and my tank would do.

When I came back to the bed Jess was inside it and laying still on her back like a vampire rests stiff in it's coffin.

"What are you even doing?" I laughed. She still had her jacket on and her shoes. She had her jeans on. People didn't sleep like that. I knew that Jess didn't sleep like that. If Jess was going to sleep, I mean really sleep, she'd wear next to nothing and force herself to empty her mind. Her body language showed the exact opposite but she had come to my door for this and I knew that.

"What?"

"Come on," I said, crawling over her and straddling her. I looked down on her in the darkness and saw her. She always seemed so vulnerable to me somehow. That killed me but I loved it too much. It was such a contradiction. She was a contradiction. I was addicted to her, no doubt.

I unzipped her jacket and began to slowly move it off of her. I knew she wasn't going to help me. I also knew she needed to be treated like she was delicate sometimes. Just like she needed to be treated like she was unbreakable. She was perfect that way.

"I know you don't sleep with your clothes on," I said. It was perfectly unnecessary of me to remind her. We'd slept together so many times. The only times she actually slept were the times where she was either naked completely or wearing next to nothing, she knew it as well as I did.

"So," Jess said grumpily. I looked down at her and gave her an exhausted yet condescending look.

When she met me only with silence and that stare I moved my hand to the nightstand drawer and pulled out a crystal glass and a bottle of whiskey. This I kept for nights just like this when I knew she'd come and I knew it'd be my job to settle her mind and body. For as long as I'd known her it seemed it was beginning to take more and more to calm her mind. We had Kilgrave to thank for that. That and Jessica's own stubbornness to actually try and alleviate these things.

A bit angered but mostly glad she was with, I crawled over her to better reach the nightstand. I laid on top of her and let out a sweet sigh. She always felt better than anyone else ever could. I felt her hand on my skin at my back by my hip just above my ass. I felt her thumb slip under my jeans absentmindedly like it used to when we used to do this more often. I closed my eyes to feel it as I took the glass in my hand, poured a small spot of whiskey and gulped it right down.

"Okay. Now you," I said, getting up from off of her and pouring a more generous amount into the glass. I felt myself breathless even from just that small bit of friction between our bodies and our skin.

She watched up at me and waited. I screwed the top back on the bottle and set it down, taking the glass in my hand and motioning her to sit up.

Once she'd done it I handed her the glass and watched as she drank. I leaned down and kissed her forehead.

"Good girl," I said. As if she'd taken medicine, swallowed it down. So much about this felt a fevered routine.

I moved down to her feet and took her shoes away, throwing them to the ground.

Then I moved to her jeans, unbuttoning them. When I moved to pull them off though she stopped me with both of her hands. I could tell she was holding back her strength. She always did that with me. She was always too gentle.

"Fine," I said, knowing well that she always took them off to sleep. I heard her wiggling back down to lay in that flat way on the bed on her back.

I walked to my side of the bed and fell into it, pulling the covers over myself and cuddling up to her, holding her like I was so used to doing. There was nothing better than breathing her in.

"Please sleep," I urged. But I wanted to kiss her. I wanted to kiss her so bad. I just didn't want to scare her off, not again. All the things with Kilgrave set her mind on fire. I wanted to help her get rid of all that. I wasn't sure kissing would do the trick. I wasn't sure I could even help. I'd tried this same thing several times lately and it hadn't worked for long. She'd lay beneath me a while and when she thought I was sleeping she'd get up, put her clothes on and leave. It was near tragic.

"I will," she said, breaking me from my sad thoughts of how she was always leaving me. She moved a hand to hold at my neck and keep me close. I breathed her in and kissed the part of her wrist that was already near my face.

Those words were in me again. I kept them in again, _**I love you, I love you, I love you…**_

I wanted to speak.

She shifted and moved so her forehead was against mine. I felt her holding my hand and kissing the back of it before letting out a heavy sigh.

"What?" I asked, opening my eyes to look at her. Her eyes were searching mine. I could feel them on my lips. It made me search her lips too. I missed them, too much. I took my thumb to her lips and rubbed them while biting my own bottom lip and wishing I could know what she was thinking all the time.

She kissed my thumb and I closed my eyes and smiled despite it all.

I moved my body in closer to hers, pulling at her skin above her jeans and bringing her in to hug me full on. I wanted her body as close to mine as it could be. I wanted it to be like when we were young and we first touched. It still felt like that, always.

I needed her head on my chest. I wanted her listening to my heart and how it raced.

"You feel that, right?" I asked.

"I do," she said sweetly, pulling me close using a bit of her strength.

I let out a slight moan. Her strength, when she used it, even a little, it always surprised me.

I felt her breath on my neck, her lips ghosting as her hands grasped to feel the skin of my neck.

She pushed me back, pushed on top of me. I kept my eyes closed. Sometimes I wanted it too much.

"Look at me," she said, her hand at my chin.

I opened my eyes and felt her hand with my own.

I knew she could feel it, how much I wanted her. She let her eyes see my lips again and I waited, wanting her.

"I'm here," I said, since my eyes weren't enough, I had to say it.

"Okay," she said, taking her thumbs beneath my chin, her other fingers behind my neck. She led me up. "Kiss me," she whispered, pulling me in. This was new. She didn't usually speak to me like this, didn't usually give orders. I felt her lift my head up and catch my lips with her own. I felt her lips on mine and her tongue sneaking in. I felt how familiar it was but also how perfect.

Then I felt as her hands led me back down every so soft, her lips never leaving. I felt her kiss deepen, her body move up on mine, sending a shock all through me as I gasped.

We both tasted like whiskey. I'd come to associate the taste of whiskey with kissing Jess. Sometimes I'd drink a little alone though I usually stayed away from it. Just a small taste on my tongue could subdue my cravings for her for just a little while.

Sometimes it felt like we were all or nothing. Other times we were delicate, gentle, soft.

 **Part 3**

Alcohol fueled sleep came after kissing. There was always a sexual tension to our interactions but most of the time it never went there. We sought comfort in each other. It all started when we were nineteen.

We got ahold of two bottles of wine at some event my mom booked me for. It was dumb but we went upstairs to the hotel room we were sharing and cracked one of the bottles open on the balcony railing. Bringing a corkscrew didn't seen quite as important as getting away from my mother so we didn't have one.

I got drunk first but Jess eventually caught up and we collapsed giggling on the concrete, making fun of all the people that we had encountered downstairs. Jessica was my comfort and I was the only person she loved.

She leaned toward me like some old man with a Patsy fettish had at the party but instead of pulling away like I had from the man, I closed the gap and we were kissing. When I thought she would pull away she didn't.

It wasn't my first kiss, nor hers, but it was the first one that made me feel anything. The universe opened up for me that night, starting in my chest. I felt so full of everything that I thought I would burst. It didn't go all the way that night. We stopped at making out because I was too drunk to function.

When I woke I had to wonder if it was just the wine but as soon as I turned over and saw her, it was so clear. She was the cause of it not the alcohol. I changed with those kisses and I know she did too but she wouldn't show it.

We never talk about it. Even though it's happened so many times since then. Not after Kilgrave. That hurt. She just pulled away and I knew why but it still fucked with my heart. I knew where she moved to but even when I tried to visit it wasn't the same. She pushed me so far away that I could hardly feel the connection anymore. She wanted that from me.

Now, after being so close to losing each other we were reconnecting. I dreamed that we were together for real, something I never thought of really. We were what we were and I always assumed that I would find someone and she would find someone but we would always be there for each other even to the detriment of our other relationships.

When I woke it wasn't just our past that I'd seen it was a future and some kind of poisonous hope was inside of me. Deep down I wanted it. Maybe I always had but I just never thought of it as an option. Here in this house where her life had started, where she was once happy, I guess some sense of a real future together had invaded me.

I rolled over, and just like that first night years ago I saw her, and I was whole. She knew me like no one else ever could and I knew her. We could be good. "Jess," I whispered but she didn't wake. Just as well, I needed to feel this out. I might be crazy.


	3. Chapter 3

**Chapter Three**

 **Part I**

Leaving for work I see Birch Street, Higgins Drive, Cobalt Lane. I turn on the latter and wait at the light. The first time it happened I was stunned. I parked at the light, I felt almost blocked, stuck. It was like I was in her mind, being led by her and then kept. I had to shake it off.

Now when it happens I think of her sitting next to me in the passenger seat and seeing it too. To her it's a safe place, that house, these streets. Even after Kilgrave tried his best to corrupt it, it's still her safe place, which means her therapy, the little that she agreed to go through, actually worked. It only makes sense to turn the pretty house into an actual headquarters, Alias Investigations, an actual fortress. Jessica left that seedy apartment building where so much loss took place. That place was never really her. At least I hope it wasn't. She sees herself one way and I see her another. She wants to be a shadow but she's a hero. She's always made a difference, always.

It's dark when I leave in the mornings but nothing can beat the days where I wake-up and see that Jess actually stayed with me, actually slept through the night.

I kissed her cheek and then her lips, lingering in her, that familiar taste of her kiss, sweet poison on my tongue. It was so tempting to just sleep, and just hold her, just a little bit more. But I have a day-job and it demands my time. Plus, as soon as she woke anyway she'd be up and out of sight, I knew her well, she'd want to be anywhere else pretending we didn't just kiss again or claw at each other's skin and clothes wishing for better lives and more time for just us.

 **Part 2**

Trish Talk was mostly about the political debate. As an educated woman it was hard for me to even have a debate while knowing how little the people actually get to decide when it comes to all that. At one point Jess called in just to tease me. She must've been listening. She must've known I was already annoyed.

She pretended to be Virginia Miller, a young republican woman just out of college, completely obsessed with Donald Trump and _**ALL FOR**_ his candidacy. It was hard not to laugh. Often she fucks with my talk show and often I nearly crack. She knows my buttons and she loves to push them, she relishes it.

I couldn't wait for the show to be over. I wanted to kick her ass, at least scold her.

When I called though she was already back to being stoic Jess, professional Jess.

"Hey, I'm with Jeri, call you soon."

That was all she said. Then the line went dead.

If there was one thing I hated it was being treated like I wasn't important when I knew that I was.

In a lot of ways, Jess and I would always be those little girls, so different, so busy, so separate.

 **Part 3**

I went home to my apartment for lack of a better place to go. Taking the elevator up felt familiar yet cold. For the longest time this apartment had been ours, mine and hers. Coming back to it now meant remembering the person I had to build when she was away. Not out of fear but out of loneliness and frustration. I never lacked people in my life. The only person I could ever lack was her and she knew. Just another thing we never talked about. Like her family and my mother.

I let myself in, remembering all the things that had happened inside the "safe" walls. Even after everything I felt ready to take on anything that could be on the other side.

Still, rounding the corners, I remembered Simpson and reached for the gun concealed in my bag like a practiced cop would do just to clear the area and deem it safe. I was more worried about the supernatural than the natural. I could take Simpson when he wasn't on those super-soldier pills. I could take a person under mind control when they were void of super strength.

The gun in my hand wasn't Simpson's but it reminded me of him. He'd been sweet, misguided. He'd been a fabulous waste of time. Nothing less nothing more. Our whole relationship stemmed from my boredom and curiosity. I wanted to take him on, physically. I wanted to test my skills, really test them.

It was stupid. I knew it was. But I needed to play with him.

I hadn't anticipated the pills. But they explained a lot now. Looking back on it now I can only think of what a good lay he was. He let me use him to take my mind off of Jess.

I got to my training room and swerved around the doorway. I lowered my Glock and looked down at it sardonically. Who was I kidding? I would always prefer things to be hand-to-hand. Watching Jessica fight was so invigorating. It did things to me. Woke me up and made me to feel strong.

I put the gun back in its holster and stripped my jacket off my body.

Without thinking I flew across the room and threw a kick at the training bag, knocking it hard and landing on my feet.

I felt myself pant.

I felt myself alone.

I swung my body around and landed a hard punch with the back of my hand on the center of the bag to remind it not to see me as weak. I was anything but that. I might not be as strong as Jessica but I could take down a man, defend myself. Fighting alongside a superhero wasn't exactly easy.

My phone rang in my pocket. Surprised at myself, I jumped and clutched my chest before remembering that it was just a phone and nothing else, nothing threatening.

I reached into my pocket and pulled out the phone, checking the display. It wasn't a number I recognized. Then again, sometimes Jessica called me from numbers other than her cell when it was necessary.

"Hello?" I answered, my voice giving away that I had just attacked something. I immediately wished I hadn't answered.

The voice on the other end of the line crackled with the reverb of electronic distortion, snapping me out of my thoughts. "We are the Collective. If the girl's parents want their daughter back you're going to do exactly what we say."

"What?! Who the hell are you?"

The voice came back over the line, more impatient. I could tell even through the weird static.

"We will call you in exactly twelve hours with instructions on what to say on your show. We know Jessica Jones is looking for the girl and if you both know what's good for you. You'll do what we want."

The line went dead and I pulled the phone away from my face, staring at it. "What the fuck," I whispered.


	4. Chapter 4

**A/N: Thanks for your feedback! Keep it coming, please. We would love to hear from you.**

 **Part I**

"What exactly did he say?"

"The-they called themselves _**the collective**_." When she pushed me, sometimes, it was hard to be quick, especially after a long day and an early morning. I already told her everything but she was still trying to push. All I wanted to do was take a bath and laugh and have a good time but here I was in her space being grilled. With Jess every single day was a goddamn emergency.

"What?!" She seemed pissed and I completely understood why. She was desperate. They'd issued a threat, the collective, and she was desperate to combat them.

"Yeah, I know," I said, trying to comfort in premature defeat.

"Okay, what else?" She pushed. "Did you get any other names, anything important? Any clues? Anything?!"

"Jess." She always got like this when she was frustrated. On a normal day she could be silent as ever only stopping every once and a while to say something overly detailed and witty, something that would floor me completely and make me think for days upon days upon days about how insightful she was, how lovely. My favorite was when she made me laugh but this wasn't that, this was Jess in business mode, professional Jess, uptight Jess.

"Don't," she said, realizing I was soft. "Anything else, Trish. Did you get anything else?!" The implication was there. She wanted me to be business.

I didn't do enough. Message received. I am the worst. I am not fit. I am insufficient. I am not a hero. Message. Received.

"You already know I wish I could say yes to that." Sometimes she really needed me to rub it in, the different ways in which she chose to hurt. She intended. There was always intention. It all burned. Always. And she could see. But she always seemed to want me to run from her. That was never my path.

She looked at me, saw me. Maybe for the first time tonight.

"Dammit," she said, shoving the table until it flew across the room and hit hard against the stationary wall that had once run parallel but separate to it's edge. She wouldn't have done that if I was standing on the other side. I knew that. Still the table hit the wall so hard the ledge made a long indent and I knew that it would take Jessica's force to get the table out from the wall, not my force, not Malcolm's force, not Simpson's super soldier-force, Jessica's specific force, that would be the only force to remove it.

"What are we gonna do?" I asked, ignoring her rage. I understood her rage. I'd have her rage too if I were her. Whatever I felt, as insignificant and powerless as I felt, Jess felt that one hundred times worse because she was one hundred times more equipped to fight these types of battles and win them and help the hopeless and help the helpless and save the seemingly damned. Despite all her self-loathing, despite all her badittude and show, Jess is an overwhelmingly caring person, she cares TOO MUCH.

It hurts her to care so much and fail. And I know that more than anyone because I'm always here, I'm always watching.

I watch her far more often than anyone else ever could. It's why I love her, it really is. She cares more about others than she ever could about her own precious life.

When I stop to think of how quick she was to lose herself with Kilgrave it makes me more angry than I can bare because it means too much, it says too much about her. She always had the strength in her to say no. I believe that. I do. It was buried down deep below the part of her that submerged underneath Kilgrave's will. It took murdering an innocent woman for her to emerge. But how can I talk about that? How can _**WE**_ talk about that?!

"No, Trish," her voice shook in that way it always did when she was sick of explaining things to me, when she just expected me to obey like she _**NEVER**_ would.

I had to stop and shut my eyes. I had to take a few deep breaths. I had to think back on the night, remember her lips on my neck her voice in my ear, her hands on my skin. I touched a hand to my neck just to feel, just to brace myself for her words, whatever they would be.

" _ **We**_ aren't going to do anything," she started strong. "I know you want to help me with this stuff, but, Trish…" she faltered a little before, licking her lips and, regaining her strength. "This isn't Kilgrave. I don't _**need**_ you." The way she looked at me sometimes, just like the way she dodged me sometimes… Her eyes seemed sure and as fortified as a solid metal door. Her mind was always made up.

I could translate the words. "I don't need you" meant "I can't lose you". She really did think she could trick me, keep me out. She really did think I could just believe her without thinking of why she would say the things that she says and why she would do the things that she does.

I'm not that teenager anymore. I understand her now. Maybe too much.

"That's great," I scoffed, wiping my face with my hands and throwing them up without looking at her. I actually thought we'd gotten somewhere. I thought we were done having this stupid fucking debate. We were both here now. We were both living at Alias Investigations. We were both together again. We were, again, a _**we**_.

Every time she said shit like this I wanted to throw things, physically chuck things, sometimes right at her face. I knew she'd be able to stop any flying object and that was half of the temptation. I just wanted her to know. I wanted her to know how mad I was. How mad she _**CONSTANTLY**_ chose to make me. Instead I held it in. "Nice Jess," I said, turning from her and trying hard not to laugh in my sadness and hopelessness. I knew it hurt her more if I did less. "Real nice," I exhaled, wishing I could portray even less.

Truth was I was seconds from crying. That was so like me too. Pathetic Trish. Weak Trish. The girl who needed a fucking hero. The girl who could never stand up for herself.

I always hated when it was her though. Anyone else was fine. She was the one who seemed to raise me to the heavens and yet I could let little things like this pull me down and down and down until I was beneath the soil and buried, just waiting for death. I felt like I was suffocating when she treated me like this, I really did. A part of me really thought she knew and another part told me to stop thinking she could ever understand. She was the closest person to me but sometimes she felt like she was the furthest away.

"Trish," She said, apologetically, reaching for me.

She was trying to stop me from leaving, from _**having**_ _**feelings**_.

"No. Ya know what? No," I said, taking the stairs up to her new room rather quickly and shutting myself in. She could sleep in her old room. She could sleep where we slept _**TOGETHER**_ last night. She could sleep where she could smell me on the sheets and remember me in her arms. That was her fucking choice. Her choice.

I was taking her room now. And I _**would**_ sleep _**WITHOUT**_ her.

I was sick of this shit. I was sick of being treated like I could never really be a player.

I wasn't some housewife. I wasn't some weak child, some liability.

I threw my shirt off and kicked away my shoes. I walked to her bath and turned it on. I needed to drown it all out, all of it. Sometimes she could really get to me. I hated that about her. She was the only person now who was capable of that. My mom used to do it. My mom used to be able to make me feel sick inside, make me feel wrong. Now only Jess did that, only Jess made me question.

When she loved she loved hard but when she cut, she cut deep.

I filled the water up too high and immersed myself inside, sinking deep and letting out a much needed scream.

After that none of it mattered.

Jess left to do her work. Jess left to busy herself with anything and everything.

I stayed.

I always stayed.

The heat of the water seared my skin as I tried again to forget about everything about us that was wrong.

It hurt to know we could never just be okay. It hurt because I had no control, none at all.

No matter what I did it would never be enough. Jess would always need to help and I would always need to help her and there was no ending that for us, not while both of us still stood.

The thought of it all overwhelmed and made me tired.

I rest in the bath and tried to think of other things but for me that was hard...

 **Part II**

Much later. After the sun sank low and the moon rose high, I took to resting at long last and made myself meditate on the feel of her, the happy times. That was the only thing that could settle me.

I was sleeping sound, naked in her bed. I felt a form come near, a naked form just like mine.

My first thought was to react. I tried to turn but strong hands held me and I knew.

"Shhhh," I heard her whisper. Once I stopped fighting, her arms enveloped me and pulled me. I felt her body behind mine, her lips at my ear. "It's just me," she said, lovingly, folding me up in her arms and holding me tight.

It was hard to take her love after the hurt of her, all the pain.

I felt her hand on my face, pushing my hair back and loving me.

I stayed quiet and tried to forget.

She hugged me tight though, squeezed me and I knew she needed me.

"What happened?" I asked.

"I tried to find him. Nothing... You'll have to do the show tomorrow. It's our only lead." The room was so quiet. I ached.

"Oh," I said. What else could I say? I felt the stress of it but also the hope.

"I'm sorry," she said. I felt her hand lower to my neck and tug as she held herself to me and kissed at the back of my shoulder. "I was an asshole," she mumbled. I could hear her smelling me, taking me in.

"Understatement of the year," I tried to be cold but it wasn't my way.

"Trish," she sighed, resting her forehead on my shoulder. If she tried at all it was too much trying. I knew that well. Everything hurt her. She was weak just like me, just different, so so different.

"Just hold me," I said, feeling the tears at the back of my eyes as I pulled her arm down and forced her to hold me right. I waited too long to sleep. My mind was too restless. I would be going into this thing completely blind and she knew. "What do you think he'll make me say?"

"I dunno," she said, her voice shaky again, but this time for different reasons.

"Great," I sighed, forcing her to hold me still. Sometimes she squeezed me so tight but still it was never enough. Her body was stuck to me hard but I still wanted her closer somehow.

"I love you," she said. I felt a smile tickle my lips. Ever since that day with Kilgrave she'd actually said that twice now.

"I love you too," I said, letting out a long sigh.

We'd be okay I think. We'd have to be okay…


End file.
